During that period, Korea sent warships to the Philippines and Thailand, submarines to Indonesia, and training and combat aircraft to the Philippines and Thailand. Russia also lost a few potential deals. Last year, Indonesia canceled an order for 11 Russian fighter jets, buying planes from the US and France instead.
For many Southeast Asian countries, the United States is an increasingly attractive arms supplier because it associates arms purchases with military or diplomatic support against China, Wezeman said. He added that a number of European arms suppliers are ready to help countries in the region develop their weapons industries and capabilities, in some cases through technology transfer.
John Parachini, a senior defense researcher at the RAND Corporation, said another reason to avoid buying Russian weapons is to signal a neutral stance on the Ukraine invasion.
“Despite Russia’s aggressive efforts to market its arms exports in Southeast Asia, they will find fewer customers,” he said.
An exception might be Myanmar, where the ruling military junta, subject to US sanctions restricting its arms purchases, has signaled ready to sign more arms sales with Russia. However, there are questions about whether the Kremlin has enough supplies to produce them.
Another country could be Vietnam, Russia’s biggest arms customer in Southeast Asia. Ridzwan Rahmat, chief defense analyst at Janes, based in Singapore, said that because that country’s military arsenal has been built around Soviet and Russian weapons for decades, the addition Adding weapons from new vendors can create compatibility issues.
At the same time, he added, Vietnam appears to be “gradually shifting its trajectory from Russian systems to a complex that includes NATO-compliant systems, although this will take decades.”
